'Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets' Abridged: The Cynical Version

After seven novels, a spin-off book of wizard fairy tales that wasn't that good, and eight movies, the story of The Boy Who Lived Harry Potter draws to its conclusion with the release of the final film "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2." The lovable wizard went through a lot and can finally use a rest unless author JK Rowling takes lessons from George Lucas and decides to update the story or write some potentially awful prequels.

For those who managed to let Harry Potter pass them by and suddenly feel obligated to catch up with the series thanks to children or friends dragging you to the film, here's a handy little guide abridging the the second book/film to quickly catch up.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Despite his exploits of defeating the evil wizard Voldemort as mentioned in the previous book/film, Harry Potter is quickly served humble pie with a side of reality slap to the face as he spends summer vacation in the normal world with his foster family of uncaring relatives. But the wizardry reincarnation of Jar Jar Binks but with slightly more endearing qualities warns Harry Potter not to return to Hogwarts. This cues the plot to drag Harry Potter kicking and screaming into Hogwarts with a slight detour to his friend Ron Weasley's house. There Harry Potter and his readers/viewers gain more insight into the wizardry world and Harry gets his first admirer from Ron's jailbait sister Ginny.

News of Harry Potter's renewed Lucky Bastard Syndrome spreads and a sycophant like Gilderoy Lockhart is hoping to catch some after prolonged exposure to Harry Potter. Harry Potter reunites with his other friend the genius who helps explain wizardry terms to Harry and other people ignorant to the wizardry world (aka: readers and viewers of this series) Hermione Granger. A chance encounter with Harry Potter's moral rival Malfoy results in the dropping of MacGuffin's cousin Chekov's Gun into Ginny's school supplies. Let's hope that important artifact of Voldemort's wasn't important for something to use later.

Returning to Hogwarts, Lucky Bastard Syndrome prevents Harry Potter's expulsion from the school while accidentally discovering various elements of a conspiracy against the wizardry school and non-wizard families attending. Students are getting harmed but that's become the norm of Hogwarts to the point of it being quaint. Harry Potter doesn't really have any idea what to do until Lucky Bastard Syndrome literally throws Chekov's Gun at him. Curious, Harry attempts to aim and fire Chekov's Gun hoping to solve the case but it turns out someone already has. And this Chekov's Gun provided some backstory on a seemingly innocuous former Hogwarts student who is trying his hardest not to sound manipulative or evil

And in addition to Lucky Bastard Syndrome, apparently Harry Potter can talk to snakes.

Harry Potter remains clueless about the student attacks and is waiting for someone to spell things out to him. Luckily Hermione manages to literally spell things out for him at the cost of getting attacked herself. And Ginny's missing too. This finally gets Harry and Ron off their asses and ready to crack the case using that latent snake talking skill to open up a different MacGuffin mentioned throughout this story. Gilderoy fulfills the role of obligatory teacher gone crazy and tries to kill the duo but is easily hoisted by his own petard or wand. Rather, Ron's wand.

Inside the MacGuffin conveniently titled after the titular Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter encounters the smoking Chekov's Gun that explains was fired by none other than Ginny Weasley albeit unintentionally. The Chekov's Gun reforms itself into a more human appearance and has to explain that he is a back up copy of Voldemort. Even with the series of backtracking, not even Scooby Doo could figure this out. Harry and back up Voldemort have their obligatory good vs evil fight. Still the unskilled prick that he is, it takes his Lucky Bastard Syndrome to conjure up a bird carrying a hat that conjures up a second Chekov's Gun in the form of a sword that manages to kill this copy of Voldemort. Even though Harry Potter suffered a mortal poisonous blow, Lucky Bastard Syndrome conveniently conjured up panacea to cure the poison.

Just to really recap, Headmaster Dumbledore has to explain everything again to Harry Potter while reinforcing that Harry Potter is good while Voldemort is bad. Then it's happily ever after as everything is restored to the social norm. But things can only get darker from her on out as Harry faces his greatest challenge in the third book/film:

Puberty.